Summer Work
by Beautiful Thief
Summary: Kagami gets a summer job at a coffee shop.


Coffee shop AU hastily written for wingroad on Tumblr 's KagaKuro summer minievent, and the 30 Day Cheesy Trope challenge (Day One - Coffee Shop AU). I STRUGGLED SO MUCH.

* * *

This was a terrible idea.

_Think of the shoes_, Taiga told himself. _Think of the new basketball shoes_.

Strictly speaking, the job wasn't so bad, when he got to do the barista work. It had been swiftly discovered that Taiga had very little patience for customer service, but that his drinks were really fucking good, and no one could explain how when he just followed the recipes, it was still twice as good as most of the other baristas.

But he was taking any shift he could get – basketball shoes were expensive and his parents were only so willing to shell out on shoes that he tended to ruin incredibly quickly – so the aim had been to earn a whole bunch of money over summer so that he'd be covered in the event that he needed new ones.

Also there was this one pair he had his eye on and they were a little bit more expensive than usual, and his parents definitely weren't going to buy them for him, so.

So he was working the register, because the other guy who was working this shift – his name was Aomine and he was an _asshole_ – was even worse at customer service than he was, which was probably why they rarely had coinciding shifts.

It was slow today too, a rare afternoon where the blistering heat and muggy humidity of summer had broken out into torrential downpour. Taiga was pretty sure he'd cleaned the bench three times in his attempt to find something to do. He'd clean the coffee machine, but Aomine was in the way and bitched every time he did something productive, and it was really _Aomine's_ job to clean the damn thing.

He hadn't expected the job to be quite this boring – usually he'd chat with co-workers if it was this dead, but Aomine was practically sleeping on the bench where drinks usually got passed out, and their conversations rarely went anywhere interesting anyway, because Aomine was an antisocial asshole.

The bell on the door went, and both of them stood up. Taiga was actually a little surprised – he'd thought Aomine was actually sleeping.

Taiga pasted on his terrible attempt at the customer service smile as their customer approached the register. Blond and handsome, his eyes glazed past Taiga and arrowed in on Aomine.

"Aominecchi!" he cheered, and bounced over to where Aomine had settled back to leaning on the bench after realising who their customer was. "I came to see you!"

"I can see that," Aomine said. "Why?"

"He was bored."

Taiga yelped – there was another guy there, who he hadn't noticed before. Aomine smirked at him before turning back to look at the blond boy.

"You got bored with Tetsu?" Aomine raised an eyebrow.

"Kurokocchi kept hitting me," he whined. "I needed you to kiss it better. And Kurokocchi wanted a vanilla shake."

"Are you going to order?" Taiga asked.

"Aomine-kun already knows our orders," the other boy – Kuroko, probably? - said quietly. "He'll get to them after he and Kise-kun are done flirting."

"Kise has a tab here. You know how to do them, right, Bakagami?"

"Nope," he said. It was a lie, but Aomine wouldn't know any better, and it made more work for him. "You'll have to show me."

Aomine groaned. "Fuck, why did I have to get paired up with you."

Taiga bit down on the smirk, and caught the eye of the boy, who was still standing at the register looking at him. "Can I help you...?"

The blue-eyed boy shook his head. "No, that's quite alright, Kagami-san."

Taiga pulled a face. "Kagami's just fine."

He nodded. "My name is Kuroko Tetsuya."

Over at the bench, Kise leaned over and kissed Aomine full on the mouth before sparkling his way over to a table. Aomine busied himself making the drinks, and Kuroko kind of floated his way over to where Kise had sat down.

Taiga didn't notice he was staring until Aomine elbowed him. He looked at him, about to snarl and protest, but Aomine had a serious face on which startled him enough to silence him. Aomine never looked serious. Aomine looked bored and tired and angry and frustrated and a whole manner of other negative things (and Taiga was going to studiously ignore the way he mooned over the pretty blond boy because it was gross) but not _serious_.

"Tetsu's off limits," Aomine said. "Don't even think about it."

"Don't think about _what_," Taiga muttered. "Fuck, if he's friends with you he probably has shitty-ass taste anyway."

Aomine scowled, but seemed to decide that arguing would be a waste of time and turned back to making the drinks.

* * *

Taiga never expected to see Aomine's friend again, so he was surprised when one afternoon he recognised the name on the cup of vanilla shake he was making.

"Vanilla shake for Kuroko?" he called as he put it down. He couldn't see the blue-haired boy anywhere.

"Thank you."

Taiga jerked violently, and would have knocked the drink over if it wasn't snatched out of harm's way. He looked at spot next to the bench where the voice had come from.

"Huh?"

Kuroko's mouth twitched. "Hello, Kagami-kun."

"Hi," he mumbled. He turned away to grab the next cup, fully expecting Kuroko to move away; but when he looked over again after completing the next order, Kuroko was still standing there.

"Is there something wrong with it?" he asked after passing out the iced coffee. He'd never had someone complain about his drinks before, but he didn't have any other explanation for why he was still there.

"No. It's wonderful. Thank you, Kagami-kun."

"I'm just doing my job," he muttered. The guy at the register – Taiga couldn't remember his name and couldn't see his nametag, but he was a cheerful kind of guy - slid another cup over to him, and he busied himself preparing the next order.

After he finished that order, he turned to ask Kuroko why he was still hanging around if his drink was fine, but he had already disappeared. Taiga hadn't noticed him leave.

"What the fuck."

* * *

A combination of bad luck and worse shift organisation meant that he ended up working at the same time as Aomine again the week after his weird encounter with Kuroko.

Aomine was pissier than usual, which made everything very uncomfortable. Taiga didn't always get along with him – actually, he never got along with him – but he at least tried not to take shots at Aomine while they were working.

"What the fuck is your problem?" he finally asked about halfway through his shift during a rare quiet moment.

Aomine's eyes narrowed and he stalked over to push into Taiga's personal space.

"I told you to stay away from Tetsu."

_Seriously_?

"Oh come the fuck on," Taiga said. "As if I have any control over the people I make drinks for. Piss off, Aomine."

Aomine seemed about to answer, but whether it was with his words or with his fists was lost to the void as a few customers came in, and he backed off. Taiga had to try and smile at the customers, which was not particularly successful.

"You're on the register again today, Kagami-kun?"

He hit his elbow on the bench.

He'd been just about to go fetch some more cups, since he'd noticed they were a little bit low and he didn't have any more orders to take. Or so he'd thought.

"Why do you keep _doing_ that?" he growled, rubbing his arm.

Kuroko blinked at him. "I'm not doing anything unusual."

Taiga sighed, and tried to smile. "What would you like?"

"I'd like a vanilla shake," Kuroko said, "but would it be possible for you to make it for me?"

He literally _felt_ the cogs turning in his head, and he slowly looked over at Aomine, who was suddenly looking much more focused on making drinks than he usually was.

"If you want," Taiga told him, trying not to grin at the way Aomine's eye twitched. He still had a few hours left until Aomine's shift ended, and it would really suck to have to work them with bruised ribs.

"Thank you." Kuroko passed over exact change without being told or asked. Taiga scribbled the details of his drink, although it wasn't necessary, and leaned on the bench as he waited for Aomine to be done making the other orders.

"Do you come here often?" he asked, but it was only after the words came out that he realised exactly how much that sounded like a pickup line. "Wait, I didn't mean it like that!"

Kuroko seemed unruffled by the question. "I usually only come in when I know Aomine-kun is working, since the other baristas don't make the shakes as well as they do at my usual place."

Taiga had no idea how often that was, since he didn't know how frequently Aomine worked. But he nodded as if he did and tossed Kuroko's cup from hand to hand.

Aomine had a nasty look on his face as he stomped over to the register to let Taiga make Kuroko's drink.

"Why do you want me to make it, then?" he asked as he began putting the ingredients together, even though he was fairly certain he knew the answer.

"I like yours better than Aomine-kun's."

Taiga poured the mixture into the blender. "It's the same recipe."

Kuroko didn't answer that comment, and Taiga looked over at Aomine, whose face was probably scaring off anyone who was thinking about coming in.

He returned the blended drink to its cup and handed it to Kuroko. "All done."

Aomine walked over and shoved him back at the register. "Right, you've done my job, now get back to your own."

He let himself get pushed away, because it wasn't worth fighting with him. Aomine was just as big as he was, and he had a bigger mean streak. It didn't matter in the end, though, because Kuroko migrated to stand by the register.

"Do you usually work on the registers, Kagami-kun?"

Taiga snorted. "No, only when I have to work with Aomine. I'm not good with customers."

"You're not too bad," Kuroko told him. "Aomine-kun is worse though, so I can see why between the two of you, he would be the one serving drinks, even if yours are better."

"His drinks are _not_ better than mine!" Taiga had never seen Aomine look so pissed off. It was almost magical.

"They are." Kuroko's voice was mild, so he wasn't sure why he was convinced that Kuroko wouldn't back down from his assertion.

"I'm never making you a shake again," Aomine muttered, and turned away to sulk.

"Kagami-kun will make them for me. That will make everyone happy."

Taiga didn't bother to point out that it wouldn't make Aomine happy, mostly because he had this sinking feeling like Kuroko knew perfectly well that it wouldn't.

Kuroko looked back at him. "When do you usually work, Kagami-kun?"

"Mornings on most weekdays."

Kuroko nodded and sipped at his drink.

(The rest of the shift, after Kuroko left, was spent in very cold silence, and Taiga was enormously thankful when Aomine's shift ended, even if he did punch him very hard in the ribs before he left.)

* * *

Taiga still had the bruise on his side from where Aomine had punched him next time Kuroko came in.

It was after the morning rush of crabby, fussy, zombie people who came in for their necessary caffeine fix, but before lunchtime, so it wasn't too busy. He hadn't thought when Kuroko asked when he worked that he would actually _come_. He'd kind of just written it off as a fun game at Aomine's expense.

"Isn't it a bit early to be drinking this?" he asked as he set the cup down. He hadn't seen him, but he was at least seventy five percent sure he was lurking somewhere around the bench.

"Never," was the solemn answer to his left. Taiga really wished that he could say he wasn't startled, because he shouldn't have been.

He leaned over on the bench, and then hissed and stood up straight when the edge dug into his bruise.

"Are you alright?" Kuroko asked.

"Yeah, just forgot that Aomine punched me," he told him. He was distracted for a few minutes by the need to make a few drinks, but then he returned to the bench. Kuroko had pulled a chair over.

"Why did Aomine-kun punch you?"

"Because he's an asshole?"

Kuroko just stared at him for a moment. Taiga wasn't entirely sure what message he was supposed to be getting, but there was clearly something he was supposed to be picking up.

"Aomine-kun rarely punches people just because he feels like it."

He moved away from that uncomfortable gaze and shuffled some things around to make it look as if he was doing something productive. He could feel himself being watched as he did.

"Because we stirred him up, I guess," he finally said.

"I apologise, then, for getting you injured, Kagami-kun."

Taiga shrugged. "It's no big deal, I've taken worse hits."

A sudden flurry of customers hit then, distracting him from the conversation. He'd half expected Kuroko to be gone when he looked over again, but he was still there, sitting and drinking peacefully beside the bench.

"Aren't you bored?" he asked, genuinely curious. _He_ would be bored, just sitting there. He was bored just standing here, but at least he was getting paid.

"I like people-watching," Kuroko answered, "and this is a pretty good place for it. It's also a pleasant temperature in here."

Taiga snorted.

* * *

The next time Kuroko came in, he came with Aomine's sparkly boyfriend.

He should have known the moment Kise came in giggling that Kuroko was there, because Aomine wasn't working today, so blondie had no apparent reason to be here.

"Ah, it's Kagami!" Kise said, skipping right past the register and the customers in line there to stand in front of him. "Kurokocchi tells me your drinks are better than my Aominecchi's, but I don't believe it for a moment."

"Okay?" He was more than a little confused as to what Kise was expecting from him, and he was too distracted by making drinks to think about it.

"Kise-kun, you can't just skip the line and expect me to order for you," came Kuroko's voice from the right. "Also, Aomine-kun never makes your drinks according to the recipes, so it won't be a fair comparison."

"Hey, Kuroko," he greeted him. "Did you order yet?"

Kuroko shook his head. "Go order for us, Kise-kun. You said you'd pay for me today."

Kise sighed, but he wandered to the back of the line anyway. Taiga was too busy making drinks to talk to Kuroko, but he looked over at him every now and again. He'd taken up residence at the spot next to the bench that he seemed to like.

He knew he'd gotten to Kise and Kuroko's order when he reached the vanilla shake, and couldn't help the laugh that spilled out.

"Here," he said, sliding their drinks at them. Kuroko's fingers brushed over his own as he snatched at his drink.

"Thank you, Kagami-kun."

Kise was less eager for his own drink, but, as Taiga and Kuroko watched, he sipped at it.

"...Aominecchi would definitely hurt me if I said yours was better," he said simply. "So _my_ drink isn't. If Kurokocchi would share..."

"No," was the immediate answer. Taiga snorted, and turned back to making new orders. He could hear Kise and Kuroko whispering to the side, but couldn't make out the actual words over the constant sound of the blenders and coffee-machine.

It didn't stop him from laughing when out of the corner of his eye, he watched Kise double-over in pain, and Kuroko sip, deceptively placid, from his drink.

* * *

At some point, it stopped being notable when Kuroko came in, and instead became routine.

The time he appeared was never the same, and Taiga never asked how Kuroko knew when he was working, but he almost always arrived at a quiet time and stayed until it would get busy, watching people come and go.

One of their earliest conversation attempts led to a discussion of basketball, when Taiga asked how, exactly, Kuroko knew Aomine and Kise.

"We used to play on the same basketball team," Kuroko told him. This instantly perked Taiga's attention.

"You play basketball?"

"Yes. I'm a very weak player, but Aomine-kun and Kise-kun are both very good."

Taiga grinned. "That's awesome. I play basketball too. Actually, I got this job because I keep ruining my shoes and my parents won't pay for them."

Kuroko turned a tiny smile at him. "Kagami-kun is a basketball idiot, then?"

"I don't know what you mean by that. It sounds like a bad thing but you said it like it was a good thing."

He didn't end up getting an answer to what was meant by the comment, because a sudden influx of teenage girls made him very busy, and when he was finally done with all their drinks, Kuroko had left.

Since then, though, Kuroko's visits had been much more interesting. He'd learned that Kuroko enjoyed mystery novels, and that even though he claimed he wasn't very good at it, he loved basketball more than pretty much anything. Well, Taiga could kind of relate. He loved basketball too, though he would never be able to claim he wasn't any good at it.

Somewhere along the road, he started giving Kuroko refills, which he wasn't strictly speaking, supposed to do. The first time, they'd been in the middle of discussing a basketball game they'd both watched last night, and he'd noticed Kuroko's cup was empty. It was quiet, and the guy on the register, who knew nothing about basketball at all, had gone to the bathroom.

"Gimme that," Taiga said. It wasn't really so much a request as a warning, as he snatched the cup from Kuroko's hand and put the ingredients for a refill in it.

"Thank you. I didn't think you were allowed to do that," Kuroko finally said as he put the cup back down for him.

"Well, strictly speaking, I'm not," he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck.

Kuroko smiled then, a small curve of the lips more than Taiga had ever seen on him before, and then he took a sip of his new drink.

And then summer was almost over. Taiga had a nice, healthy emergency shoe fund, and had made a cool new friend, and was now going to have to quit the job because with his grades there was no way he could juggle working and being at school _and_ playing basketball.

He just had to figure out how to tell Kuroko.

Taiga had two weeks left before his last shift; the first one Kuroko turned up to, he couldn't bring himself to say anything about the impending end of his job; the whole time Kuroko was there, he spent thinking about how to bring it up. He was pretty sure Kuroko had figured out that there was something bothering him; he'd dropped more cups that day than he'd done the entire time he'd been working here.

The next time Kuroko came in, he blurted it out. Apparently, he was unable to do middle grounds.

"I'm not going to be working here anymore," came right out of his mouth as he set the drink down, because he was pretty sure if he didn't say it right then and there he was going to spend the rest of their encounters, today and in the future, dropping cups and spilling things and just generally being a disaster.

"Good morning to you too, Kagami-kun," Kuroko said, taking the cup from the bench. "How come?"

"I can't juggle school and basketball and work," he mumbled. It was one thing to accept that he knew he wasn't smart, and quite another thing to admit it to another person.

"It's good that you have an understanding of yourself and your abilities," Kuroko said. "It's a shame, though. I've become addicted to your vanilla shakes, Kagami-kun. You'll have to take responsibility."

Taiga stared. Kuroko had spoken as usual, lacking much intonation and with a completely straight face. He wasn't sure if this was a joke or not.

"Is this a joke?"

"I never joke." Kuroko put his drink back down on the bench, pulled a pen out of his bag and snatched a napkin from the nearby dispenser.

He smiled, and passed it to Taiga before picking up his drink again and leaving.

When Taiga finally looked down at the napkin, what he assumed was Kuroko's phone number was staring back at him.


End file.
